Category Archives: Tales /märchen

Stories which are not regarded as possibly true.

“Peeking Heads” Ghost Story

Main Piece:

AL: This was back at my old house where I lived in. A duplex, essentially. And it was night time, and it was probably around midnight to like 1 or 2 which is I guess late for me as a child.

Me: How old were you do you think?

AL: Uhm… I think I was in like fifth or sixth grade. And I was still afraid of the dark, and so I slept with like a night light… And my room was… [across the hall] from my parents room… Connected through a hallway, a very short hallway, and both [our] doors were open. And it was dark. It was late. My parents were asleep. I was asleep. My brother slept in my parents’ room, and so… I just woke up… and I was really tired but I was peeking out at the door, and I thought I saw my brother. I assumed that this person was my brother—who had their head sticking out of the door.

Me: *in disgust* Ahhhhh!…

AL: But It was so dark because they had no light [on]… And so I was kinda like shocked, but… it was understandable in my head… I called out my brother’s name like “Jonathan!” (Silence.) “J- jonathan! W- what? Hello?” And they would just stare back at me. It’s like where—in cartoons—you would see the silhouette of their hand peeking sideways? And I would see like a hand, waving, and I was like “Jonathan! It’s late!”

Me: *laughing* Like “What the hell is this, Jonathan?!”

AL: And I kept at it. And they would not go away…. They stopped waving, and I was like “Okay, okay. Good night!” And so I would roll over and try to fall back asleep… And then I’m assuming like 10 minutes passed… I roll over again, and they’re still there with like another person. And I’m like “Mom! Hello?” *laughs* But all I could hear was my dad snoring. And so I kinda just gave up on them, and then I eventually fell asleep. And then, the next morning, I talked to them, and I was like “What were you doing? looking out the door at me?” …I spoke this to my brother first….

He was like “Huh? What do you mean? I didn’t do anything.”

AL: I was like “No, you did. You had your head out and your hand and everything… Do you not remember? Are you dumb or something?”

And he was like “No, I was sleeping!”

I was like “Mom, do you remember? You were doing the same thing.”

Mom: “Huh? No!”

AL: “What do you- what do you mean?”

Mom: “What did you see?”

I was like “You and Jonathan were like literally… Staring at me and waving… You don’t remember anything?”

Mom: “No.”

I was like “Oh… Who were they then?” (jokingly) Hello? *laughs*

Me: *laughs* So, what was their initial reaction to it? Did they not believe you?

AL: They were kinda, like, laughing at me for thinking these things— rather than like believing, which I would also understand…

Me: So, did it scare you? In retrospect? Or in the moment?

AL: In the moment, it did not freak me out… Just like really tired… It could be just my tiredness and just like hallucinating. Do you know like when its dark and you see like grains [in your eyes]?…

Me: Yeah!

AL: It could just be that… Or actual people. Who knows?

Context:

An interview I had with my roommate in the Cale & Irani Apartments at USC Village late night, with the lights out to set the mood. He is of Vietnamese descent. His younger brother, Jonathan, was five to six years old at the time.

Analysis:

I love ghost stories, especially the way in which people perform them. This is a piece of self-proclaimed folklore, and his family still laughs about it till this day. He has disclosed to me that he was deathly afraid of the dark as child, but has since grew out of it. This experience was more confusing to him than anything. Children are often associated with ghosts or spirits because they are more ‘innocent,’ and therefore can see the paranormal easier. However, they are seen as more naive, so this lends itself as to why no one believed him. Perhaps, if he were to say this today, his family would. This brings into questions the credibility of folklore and personal narratives. Is folklore just as valid when it comes from children, themselves?

Math Joke

Text

AL – So there’s a far-off place that consisted of a perfectly triangular lake surrounded by land, with three kingdoms, one on each side of the lake. The first kingdom is rich and powerful, filled with wealthy, prosperous people. The second kingdom is more humble, but has its fair share of wealth and power too. The third kingdom is struggling and poor, and barely has an army.
The kingdoms eventually go to war over control of the lake, as it’s a valuable resource to have. The first kingdom sends 100 of their finest knights, clad in their best armor, and each with their own personal squire. The second kingdom sends 50 of their knights, with fine leather armor and a few dozen squires of their own. The third kingdom sends their one and only knights, an elderly warrior who has long since passed his primes, with his own personal squire.
The knight before the big battle, the knights in the first kingdom drink and make merry, partying into the late hours of the night. The knights in the second kingdom aren’t as well off, but have their own supply of grog and also drink late into the night.
In the third camp, the faithful squire gets a rope and slings it over the branch of a tall tree, making a noose, and hangs a pot from it. He fills the pot with stew and has a humble dinner with the old knight.
The next morning, the knights in the first two kingdoms are hung over and unable to fight, while the knight in the third kingdom is old and weary, unable to get up. In place of the knights, the squires from all three kingdoms go and fight. The battle lasts ling into the night, but by the time the dust settled, only one squire was left standing—the squire from the third kingdom.
And it just goes to show you that the squire of the high pot and noose is equal to the sum of the squires of the other two sides.

Context

I like to collect jokes, specifically puns, on various topics so that no matter what situation I am currently in, I can say, “Oh, I know a joke about that!” I have found that most people have a love/hate relationship with puns; they tend to love telling them and hate hearing them. I mostly tell puns to family and friends, and their anger and frustration fuels me. Though my friends groan and sigh every time they hear a pun, they will still send me any good ones that they find. I also find puns on various social media platforms, in books, and on the occasional popsicle stick. Any time that I find or am sent a pun that I like, I write it in a book that I keep specifically for this purpose. My very favorite kinds of puns are the ones that are long and drawn out, ones that are a paragraph, maybe two, and you get to the end and the last line is a clever pun that uses many elements of the story that came before it. My second favorite kinds of puns are the short rude/dirty ones, because in addition to the reaction you get for any other pun, you also get the shock reaction from the vulgarity. I save the more risqué puns for close friends, as I don’t want to offend the delicate sensibilities of people that I don’t know very well.

Analysis

This pun begins as a lengthy narrative that misleads the listener from thinking about puns. The punchline is succinct. And it is not necessarily comprehensible to everyone. Specifically, the listener must have a basic understanding about geometry. What initially sounds like an attractive David-and-Goliath story is actually… a math joke. The punchline, “the squire of the high pot and noose is equal to the sum of the squires of the other two sides,” can be misheard (with the right mindset and maths knowledge) as “the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides.” Not only is the listener tricked into listening into a pun (as the informant mentioned, most people hate hearing them), but they are also tricked into having to think about math, which, depending on the audience’s preference for school subjects, is insult to injury.

Tiger and the Fox

Story: This story is about a uh… a fox who happens to stumble upon a tiger. The tiger caught the fox, and before the tiger could eat him, the fox lies and tells the tiger to wait, because he is sent to the earth as the king of animals. Well, the tiger doesn’t believe him until he saw that the fox isn’t scared, so he asks the fox to prove it. So the fox… Um. Oh, yeh the fox takes him for a walk and tells the tiger to walk behind him since everyone that saw him would be scared. So every animal they saw runs away in fear, obviously because of the tiger, but the tiger doesn’t even know that. According to the tiger all the animals are scared of the fox(raises hands slightly, fingers outstretched)! He realizes the fox must be right, and runs away as well. That’s it.

Context: I took this interview in person and recorded it so I could transcribe it later.

Thoughts: When asked about how this story was significant to them, they tell about how this was told to them by their mother when they were a child as a bedtime story. They didn’t completely understand what time meant back then, other than “foxes are scary”, but now they think of it differently. The informant feels that now, after reflecting on the story, they realize how it is not only a lesson about being clever, it is a lesson about confidence.

Analysis: I also agree that it is a lesson about confidence. It is a lesson on tactful confidence and manipulation, to get out of a dire situation. The lesson in this tale is clear: you don’t have to be the strongest person in the room if you are the smartest. This can apply to a lot of situations in my adult life, and I’m sure for everyone else’s too.

Lạc Long Quân and Âu Cơ in Vietnamese Folklore

Main Piece:

AL: The tale of Lạc Long and Âu Cơ:

Lạc Long Quân was born in 2800 BC. He is the sun of a mountain god… and his mother is uh the sea god. His body is a dragon of some sort even though his parents… Was a sea dragon and his father the son of mountain… [He] was like a human-ish figure. His name, Lạc Long Quân, translates to Dragon Lord of Lạc. Lạc is a place in Vietnam…

Âu Cơ is the daughter of the northern chief… And fairy from the mother… Lạc Long Quân, the dragon, decided to take the form of a handsome man because he has that power, and Âu Cơ is a fairy. And so they married, and um *laughs* interestingly enough, Lạc Long Quân married the daughter but killed the father. I know. It’s weird… You would think that you shouldn’t kill the daughter’s father…

Anyway, so they had sex, and uhm she gave birth to a sack of a hundred eggs, and they grew into a hundred boys… Or children, depending on lore, and reestablished Vietnam. Uhm they say that all ancestors descend form these 100 children… Âu Cơ loved the mountain, so she really liked the north side. Lạc Long Quân loved the water because his mother is a water dragon… And so they decided to split the kids in half, or not in half— *laughs* divide the kids in half, fifty-fifty, and take them to either location… Half of them in the mountain and half of them near the sea… It was agreed by both parents that they would help each other in need. Lạc Long taught his children to fish and tattoo. Âu Cơ taught her children to farm and breed animals.

In Saigon, there are two streets who intersect. One is named Lạc Long, and one is named Âu Cơ, and they intersect because they’re married to each other… It’s very cute… Probably intentional… And then Lạc Long is known as the first king of Vietnam…

Context:

Taken from a conversation with my roommate in the Cale & Irani Apartments at USC Village. Him and I are of Vietnamese descent.

Analysis:

Myths are like adult versions of fairy tales. Historically, they have helped societies try to understand elements of the natural world or the scientific phenomena around them. Here, this myth plays into patriotic ideals in the founding of a nation and a unification between the rivalry of North and South Vietnam. These cross-generational stories are kept alive by the communities performing them. These two figures are so deeply incorporated into Vietnamese culture that there’s many pieces of art dedicated to them. In fact, there is a temple dedicated to the Dragon Lord. Furthermore, the intersecting streets are just further proof of how stories like these unify people through their collective imagination, childhoods, and rich cultural histories and beliefs.

Why Chinese People Have Short Names

Nationality: Chinese
Occupation: Barber
Performance Date: 4/28/22
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

This is a story that I heard from a barber when discussing folklore origins. S is a middle aged Chinese woman who used to live in China before immigrating to the United States.

S: There was one about a boy with a super long name who fell down a well and almost died because his name was too long. I think his name was “Tiki-tiki-tembo-no-sar-embo-charri-barri-boochi-pip-perry-pembo” or something like that. It was Chinese.. custom to say the full name of a firstborn child. So the boy with the long name had a brother with a short name, and they were playing next to a well by their house. The younger brother fell into the well, so the older brother ran to their mom and said Chang fell into the well! Oh, and Chang was the name of the younger brother.

Me: Oh nooo! Were they able to save him?

S: Yes! They got a ladder to help Chang climb out of the well right away and he was just fine. Then another day, the two brothers were playing next to the well again when this time it was the older brother who fell!

Me: (groans) come on guys, do better. Silly little kids!

S: So this time, Chang runs to his mom and tries to tell her that Tiki-tiki-tembo-no-sar-embo-charri-barri-boochi-pip-perry-pembo fell into the well. But since he ran there, he was so out of breath that he could only say tiki-tiki-tembo… before running out of breath. His mom was so intent on respecting her first-born son’s name that she would not listen until he was able to say (inhales largely) Tiki-tiki-tembo-no-sar-embo-charri-barri-boochi-pip-perry-pembo. Whew! That was hard hahha.

Me: (trying to say it with her) Tiki-tiki-tembo-no-sar-embo-charri-barii-boochi alala blehhh. I couldn’t imagine having a name that long. That must suck!

S: Yeah anyways, they finally got the ladder after Chang was able to pronounce his brother’s name, but he was basically almost drowned by this point. They were able to save him, but it took him a long time to recover. And that’s why Chinese people have short names!

Me: Wow, what a cool tale! I hope that the mom learned her lesson, that could’ve ended really badly.